Thursday, September 27, 2012

We're Baaack!/"They're Baaack!"


With the protests breaking out again in Greece and Spain, I decided yesterday morning to resume my blogger’s account of events in this late phase of late capitalism, and, I’m afraid, took the less-than-inspired, less than original, title “We’re Baaack!” as a way of announcing a renewed presence. I thought that “We” could also serve as a Blogger’s We (a descendent of the “editorial We” from the days of print journalism) that said that your faithful blogger was again in the room. But I turned on CNBC around noon yesterday, and was greeted by Michelle Caruso-Cabrera’s introduction of the European news with “They’re Baaack!” Caruso-Cabrera, despite her right-wing orientation, had, I thought, done a good job of reporting previous Athens protests . Like me, she seemed surprised that social movements can take summers off for long European vacations.

As other reporters and analysts responded to the news from Europe, an improved grasp of economic fundamentals was evident as compared to past discussion. It is now recognized that austerity does not solve an economic crisis, repair deficits, or create jobs. Now economists recognize that austerity destroys jobs, and, by reducing tax revenues, increases deficits. Only the Republicans in the USA make the argument for austerity now, but I have come to realize that they do so only to capture votes, especially from white voters who feel that government spending directed to minorities has bankrupted the nation. The core Republicans see austerity as a way of getting the working class to pay for the economic crisis while the 1% retain their tax breaks.

Two questions about the protests kept coming up on CNBC:  What do the protestors want? and What do they think their governments can do? Long ago, in my early discussion of the Greek protests I cited the slogans of the Greek section of the Committee for a Workers International: 1. Don’t pay the debt. 2. Nationalize the banks. 3. Tax the Rich. To answer the question, “what do they think their governments can do,” as asked by the innocents at CNBC, the answer is probably “nothing.” System-change is needed.  At present, we have a crisis precipitated primarily by the fear that European banks will collapse because of “sovereign debt” that they hold.  Debts should now be paid on the basis of need (i.e. “widows and orphans”). The rich should, in the words of a famous Socialist politician in the UK, “be squeezed until the pips sqeak.“



Your humble blogger, not fully himself yet, as may be too evident, here re-enters the verbal fray after  a year and with some severe illness. After congestive heart failure, which still leaves me less than functional, I was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma, an “aggressive” form of blood cancer. I’ve been in chemotherapy for four months and have one more hospitalization (as opposed to “in-patient” treatment) ahead.

Studying my Medicare statement, I realize that no one without coverage could afford the care that I’ve received. I didn’t add them up, but the total charges would exceed $100,000. Obama’s version of Hillarycare--a pay-off to insurance companies who support the Democrats and Republicans--was a cynical political maneuver to secure the base of his party.  I support not a single-payer system, although that would be a huge improvement over Hillarycare/Obamacare, but a “no-payer system.” The huge waste in the American approach to healthcare comes from bill-collecting and financial record-keeping, not to mention the profits of the insurance companies. Dump all the other paperwork; keep only medical records: and pay the doctors as government employees until they are ready to work for their local communities.

Healthcare insurance is a particular sore point for me. After my fatrher died, my mother was left without health insurance because my father, a railroad worker, was a few months short of having his insurance “vested.” We called an insurance agent--there was no Medicaid in thise days--and he asked for such a high premium that my mother was both angry and in tears. She drove him from the house. In the transition to socialism, we must call on the working-class to show all restraint toward our present-day masters and toward the petite bourgeois. The impulse to take revenge must be checked. But the healthcare insurance incident still makes me angry.